5 Talking Points from UFC 208

#5: What the hell is going on at 205lbs?

UFC 208 only had one fight at Light-Heavyweight and that was an oddity to begin with; former title challenger and perennial top five contender Glover Teixeira against Jared Cannonier, a man who’d only just dropped to 205lbs (in December) and had all of one win in the division.

I get that the UFC needs to make new stars but to me this was trying to make Cannonier run before he’d proven he could walk. Sure enough, Teixeira easily outpointed Cannonier, using his grappling game to stifle the ‘Killa Gorilla’ for a unanimous decision. The fight was hardly exciting though, and didn’t do much to rebuild Teixeira as a contender in the eyes of fans and analysts alike.

205lbs is a division that seems to be getting thinner by the month. There are three fighters at the top who are clearly above the rest in Jon Jones, Daniel Cormier and Anthony Johnson; there are two perennial contenders in Teixeira and Alexander Gustafsson, capable of giving the top three a difficult fight, and after that the landscape is largely bare, full of broken veterans like Shogun Rua and Rogerio Nogueira, and largely unproven fighters such as Jimi Manuwa, Nikita Krylov and Corey Anderson.

That’s why it’s so baffling that according to news sources this weekend, the UFC are allowing both Ryan Bader and Misha Cirkunov to move to pastures anew. You can maybe understand them letting Bader go – he’s already lost to Jones and Johnson and would most likely lose to Cormier, and he hardly has the most exciting reputation.

Cirkunov though oozes star quality – he looks like a bodybuilder, has a quiet charisma reminiscent of the great Fedor Emelianenko, and he’s also gone 4-0 in the UFC with all of his fights finished – including a big win over fellow prospect Nikita Krylov.

According to Dana White, Cirkunov “flaked out” on a new UFC deal. We don’t know the ins and outs of this but personally I can’t imagine that he was demanding that much money, and even if he was, with 205lbs looking as thin as it does right now, paying the top prospect in the division a little more would surely be worth it?

Especially on a weekend when another prospect in Cannonier was exposed as being miles away from title contention. It’s another baffling decision from the WME-IMG suits now running the UFC and it’s one I can’t imagine the Fertitta brothers would’ve made.

Got any other talking points from UFC 208? Add them below.

Until next time....